48 inmates transferred from crowded Shelby County Jail

48 defendants have been transferred pretrial from the Shelby County Jail to the Division of Correction, previously known as the penal farm, to safely manage the inmate population, the Shelby County Sheriff's Office said Monday, March 5, 2018.
The Commercial Appeal

Forty-eight pretrial defendants have been transferred from the Shelby County Jail to the Division of Correction, previously known as the penal farm, to safely manage the inmate population, the Shelby County Sheriff's Office said Monday.

Shelby County had 2,530 men in jail at the beginning of this year, one of the highest populations locally in the last three years. The January numbers were the highest since 2015 except for the November population of 2,547, according to SCSO records.

Three lawyers said they have clients — charged with crimes ranging from theft over $1,000 to aggravated assault and attempted aggravated robbery — who were recently transferred due to crowding at the jail.

"It's the first that any of us have heard of it at the courthouse," attorney Leslie Ballin said of the pretrial transfers to the Division of Correction.

Josh Spickler, director of the criminal justice reform advocacy group Just City, pointed to Cook County, Illinois, which reached a recent low of fewer than 6,000 people in jail while having a county population more than five times Shelby County's.

"Our total jail population is now quickly approaching 3,000 people," Spickler said.

Chief Deputy Floyd Bonner attributed the move of Shelby County inmates to a "safe jail management situation" that involves not only the total population but the numbers of inmates classified as being charged with certain crimes. The Shelby County Jail population was 2,453 on Monday, Bonner said.

"We decided the best thing for us to do until our numbers go down is to move some inmates out there," he said. "The average length of stay is what's hurting us right now. It's taking them longer to resolve their cases. Since that number is increasing right now, we thought it would be better to do this."

SCSO spokesman Earle Farrell said there's been an increase in inmates coming from multiple agencies.

"We've had a spike in inmates coming not just from us, (but) MPD, Germantown, Collierville, Millington," Farrell said. "Our job is to make sure everybody is safely incarcerated."

The maximum capacity at the Shelby County Jail has been listed as about 2,800 to 3,000, but Farrell said inmates would always get moved before that number is reached. He said a system is in place to keep offenders separate by classification of types of charges.

"You don't put hardened criminals with DUI people," he said.

According to sheriff's office records showing the last three years, the jail population of women was down to 249 in January from 300 in September last year. The number of women has varied around the 200s since January 2015 when the population was 201. There were 86 juveniles in custody in January this year, down from a recent high of 99 in March 2017. There were 62 juveniles in custody in January 2015 and the population dipped as low as 45 in August 2015.